Reply to Black History Month. Does your child's school do anything if there's not a large AA population?

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[quote=Anonymous]OP: JKLM->D parent you were looking for here. Our ES school is about 11% AA, also 10% Asian, 10% Hispanic, 5% mixed race. MS is 31% AA, 13% Hispanic, 6% Asian, 5% mixed race.

In ES, the curriculum is very conscious of and reflects the diversity of the whole student body.  In social studies, and really all of the subjects from Pre-K on are inclusive of notable figures and the history and cultures of all races, genders, religions, and world cultures. For example, if a grade is studying biographies of important figures, the diversity of books they are given access to is wide, and the theme carries over into art, music, world cultures, etc. Another example, in science, when they research and study inventors, the teachers make sure that innovators of many cultures are represented, specifically AA and female inventors, and so on. But also, a lot of the curriculum is project-based and involves subject matter choices by the students -- they choose who or what their own specific topic will be within a theme (with appropriate guidance), and so you get a very wide variety of cultural representations in the final products that are then shared with the class. One kid did a biography of a Catholic Saint!

As for history, because it is DCPS, AA History is seamlessly incorporated into the curriculum. They also cover the history of DC, and DC government, and DC neighborhoods (not too much, but just enough). The history of Ft Reno, was a great topic on this as it incorporated geography (highest point in DC), some civil war history, and local history of what happened to the AA community around Ft. Reno after the war.

As for BHM: Presently in ES, among other events, the usual locations around the school building have posters celebrating black history month with a school wide quiz contest asking questions derived for the BHM posters. Every month there is a theme like this, so BHM does not stand out as something unusual.

As for Deal MS:  http://alicedeal.org/black-history-month-at-deal/  One highlight is the Speech and Drama Competition on March 3 - students read or perform literature, poems, speeches, and plays from the great collection of Black leaders, writers, diarists, and artists. It is open to all students, though the Speech and Debate Team is award winning (and many of the middle school students compete and win on the high school level), so I would anticipate some stellar performances. A few of Deal's events are open to the public, so I encourage you to attend.[/quote]

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